Carlos Castaneda

[Brant Gaede]

"I'm cutting off all conversation with Greg; I'll not sanction any more of this"

I truly enjoy your wit, Brant.

Greg

Touche.

Did you know it before I wrote it?

Is this verbal Aikito?

Anyway, since I've found you of great help in my personal life, I'll continue to improve on your various and sundry improvable positions for the general benefit of such humanity as slums here. You're welcome to share in this beneficence if you are able.

--Brant

funny, it would seem, even when I'm not trying to be

[Ellen Stuttle]

It's true, tmj -- "Everything you fear is waiting with slavering jaws in Chapel Perilous, but if you are armed with the wand of intuition, the cup of sympathy, the sword of reason, and the pentacle of valor, you will find there (the legends say) the Medicine of Metals, the Elixir of Life, the Philosopher's Stone, True Wisdom and Perfect Happiness."

Wands, Cups, Swords, Pentacles.

Parallel to the astrological elements:

Fire, Water, Air, Earth.

See for a brief description of each suit from "Psychic Library."

I don't know which deck is used for the illustrations. Not the Crowley deck. I love the Crowley deck - see.

Ellen

[moralist]

"I'm cutting off all conversation with Greg; I'll not sanction any more of this"

I truly enjoy your wit, Brant.

Greg

Touche.

Did you know it before I wrote it?

No.

I don't know anything until I write it.

Is this verbal Aikito?

Aikido.

The art of not being where your adversary is...

...is to see him not as an adversary but as an aspect of yourself. And when there's no struggle within yourself, that puts an end to your struggle with the world.

Anyway, since I've found you of great help in my personal life, I'll continue to improve on your various and sundry improvable positions for the general benefit of such humanity as slums here. You're welcome to share in this beneficence if you are able.

--Brant

funny, it would seem, even when I'm not trying to be

That's the highest form of humor.

Greg

[Ellen Stuttle]

Your inability to answer says it all, Ellen. :wink:Greg

Yeah, answering gibberish sure is difficult.

Ellen

Well, that's your opinion. The question was simple and direct:

Is the design of DNA more sophisticated than the design of any human made machine?

In your opinion it either is, or it isn't. so I can understand your reluctance to admit the obvious, for it would reveal a truth.

Of course it is. Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention. 1000 years from now, I dunno.

Perhaps the "reluctance to admit the obvious"--it's a trite truth; I was probably four or five when I figured that one out--is a reluctance to have you jump up and down with joy revelling in your "truth" as revelation. You're the only one here not trying to be rational.

--Brant

Smuggled in assumptions, and you fell right into them, Brant.

Note, Greg presumes that there's a design to DNA, furthermore, a "sophisticated" one, again implying an intelligence at work.

And on what basis do you assert that "Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention"? Complex on what scale, by what criteria?

How about this "simple" question:

Is Niagara Falls more remarkable, or Beethoven's Ninth Symphony?

Ellen

[Brant Gaede]

Your inability to answer says it all, Ellen. :wink:Greg

Yeah, answering gibberish sure is difficult.

Ellen

Well, that's your opinion. The question was simple and direct:

Is the design of DNA more sophisticated than the design of any human made machine?

In your opinion it either is, or it isn't. so I can understand your reluctance to admit the obvious, for it would reveal a truth.

Of course it is. Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention. 1000 years from now, I dunno.

Perhaps the "reluctance to admit the obvious"--it's a trite truth; I was probably four or five when I figured that one out--is a reluctance to have you jump up and down with joy revelling in your "truth" as revelation. You're the only one here not trying to be rational.

--Brant

Smuggled in assumptions, and you fell right into them, Brant.

Note, Greg presumes that there's a design to DNA, furthermore, a "sophisticated" one, again implying an intelligence at work.

And on what basis do you assert that "Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention"? Complex on what scale, by what criteria?

How about this "simple" question:

Is Niagara Falls more remarkable, or Beethoven's Ninth Symphony?

Ellen

The Ninth. So is Beethoven's biology. If you cannot find sophistication in biology, I can't show it to you. Maybe a biologist could. As for "design," I'd substitute "structure." I do note that "sophisticated" commonly implies a conscious agency behind the object discussed. I think that's too narrow.

--Brant

[moralist]

Your inability to answer says it all, Ellen. :wink:Greg

Yeah, answering gibberish sure is difficult.

Ellen

Well, that's your opinion. The question was simple and direct:

Is the design of DNA more sophisticated than the design of any human made machine?

In your opinion it either is, or it isn't. so I can understand your reluctance to admit the obvious, for it would reveal a truth.

Of course it is. Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention. 1000 years from now, I dunno.

Perhaps the "reluctance to admit the obvious"--it's a trite truth; I was probably four or five when I figured that one out--is a reluctance to have you jump up and down with joy revelling in your "truth" as revelation. You're the only one here not trying to be rational.

--Brant

Smuggled in assumptions, and you fell right into them, Brant.

Note, Greg presumes that there's a design to DNA, furthermore, a "sophisticated" one, again implying an intelligence at work.

...and that's my free choice. Just as your free to presume that there is no design to DNA, that it follows no physical laws, and that it's all just blind stupid chaotic random chance.

And notice that there is nothing preventing each of us from holding our respective views.

And on what basis do you assert that "Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention"?

Not merely complex. Sophisticated.

No DNA. No invention. For one rests upon the foundation of the other

How about this "simple" question:

Is Niagara Falls more remarkable, or Beethoven's Ninth Symphony?

Ellen

The Ninth.

And 50 trillion cells full of God-designed DNA made the free choice to compose it possible. Humans are His highest creation because we are conscious, self aware, and thus morally accountable for our behavior. Waterfalls are for the benefit of our enjoyment. We were not created for the waterfalls.

Greg

[tmj]

I see them more as screw ups, how hard is it to plan a riverbed with a consistent elevation?

[Serapis Bey]

It's true, tmj -- "Everything you fear is waiting with slavering jaws in Chapel Perilous, but if you are armed with the wand of intuition, the cup of sympathy, the sword of reason, and the pentacle of valor, you will find there (the legends say) the Medicine of Metals, the Elixir of Life, the Philosopher's Stone, True Wisdom and Perfect Happiness."

Wands, Cups, Swords, Pentacles.

Parallel to the astrological elements:

Fire, Water, Air, Earth.

See for a brief description of each suit from "Psychic Library."

I don't know which deck is used for the illustrations. Not the Crowley deck. I love the Crowley deck - see.

Ellen

Ellen, you might be interested to learn that Timothy Leary considered the Tarot an early and primitive attempt at expressing the reality of DNA and its role as biological information-storage. (Leary also considered himself to be the reincarnation of Crowley, btw).

http://www.amazon.com/Game-Life-Future-History-Series/dp/1561840505

At the heart of the manuscript is Leary's use of the Tarot to explain the eight-circuit model, in which he assumes the Tarot to be "a primitive version of the neurogenetic code contained in the periodic table." Using the Tarot's "minor arcana suits [to] represent the four amino acids, and the trumps the DNA code", Leary describes "twenty four stages in personal and species evolution." "The Tarot," he asserts, "is a concise, accurate blueprint of the {multi-billion year}course of neurogentic evolution, {past and future}. The skeletal structure of the system is accurate although the verbal labels and role designations (Fool, Pope, Emperor, Hermit) are outdated, trite, and confusing."

Greg probably considers this "satanic demonology" or somesuch.

He'd probably be right, too. ;)

p.s. Leary started to the lose the plot in his later years, but I found his pre-LSD Harvard work to have value -- his Interpersonal Circumplex, in particular. Just imagine if the early luminaries in the Oist movement had bothered to consider this material, instead of positing and having faith in absolute and effortless autonomy. I wonder if we'd have the same fractures and fissures...

Image here.

[moralist]

I see them more as screw ups, how hard is it to plan a riverbed with a consistent elevation?

Nothing keeps you from your chosen view.

Some people see beauty while others see ugliness.

Greg

[Robert Baratheon]

Nothing keeps you from your chosen view.

This is a tautology.

[Ellen Stuttle]

And on what basis do you assert that "Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention"? Complex on what scale, by what criteria?

How about this "simple" question:

Is Niagara Falls more remarkable, or Beethoven's Ninth Symphony?

Ellen

The Ninth. So is Beethoven's biology. If you cannot find sophistication in biology, I can't show it to you. Maybe a biologist could. As for "design," I'd substitute "structure." I do note that "sophisticated" commonly implies a conscious agency behind the object discussed. I think that's too narrow.

--Brant

Do you seriously not see, re the Niagara/Beethoven's Ninth question, that you don't have a common scale and common criteria for comparison? Are you merely answering on the basis of your being more impressed by the Ninth?

As to biology, I've been an avid student of biology since I was in fourth grade, and I can go through a molecular biology textbook like candy. If you want to speak of "sophistication" using language in a loose fashion, that's one thing, but even loosely speaking, you don't have a common scale and common criteria for comparing to human machine design.

Biologists sometimes do speak loosely of the design of bio-molecules, of organs, of systems, but "structure" is the accurate term.

Ellen

[Selene]

Ellen, you might be interested to learn that Timothy Leary considered the Tarot an early and primitive attempt at expressing the reality of DNA and its role as biological information-storage. (Leary also considered himself to be the reincarnation of Crowley, btw).

http://www.amazon.com/Game-Life-Future-History-Series/dp/1561840505

At the heart of the manuscript is Leary's use of the Tarot to explain the eight-circuit model, in which he assumes the Tarot to be "a primitive version of the neurogenetic code contained in the periodic table." Using the Tarot's "minor arcana suits [to] represent the four amino acids, and the trumps the DNA code", Leary describes "twenty four stages in personal and species evolution." "The Tarot," he asserts, "is a concise, accurate blueprint of the {multi-billion year}course of neurogentic evolution, {past and future}. The skeletal structure of the system is accurate although the verbal labels and role designations (Fool, Pope, Emperor, Hermit) are outdated, trite, and confusing."

Greg probably considers this "satanic demonology" or somesuch.

He'd probably be right, too. ;)

p.s. Leary started to the lose the plot in his later years, but I found his pre-LSD Harvard work to have value -- his Interpersonal Circumplex, in particular. Just imagine if the early luminaries in the Oist movement had bothered to consider this material, instead of positing and having faith in absolute and effortless autonomy. I wonder if we'd have the same fractures and fissures...

Image here.

[Ellen Stuttle]

Ellen, you might be interested to learn that Timothy Leary considered the Tarot an early and primitive attempt at expressing the reality of DNA and its role as biological information-storage. (Leary also considered himself to be the reincarnation of Crowley, btw).

http://www.amazon.com/Game-Life-Future-History-Series/dp/1561840505

At the heart of the manuscript is Leary's use of the Tarot to explain the eight-circuit model, in which he assumes the Tarot to be "a primitive version of the neurogenetic code contained in the periodic table." Using the Tarot's "minor arcana suits [to] represent the four amino acids, and the trumps the DNA code", Leary describes "twenty four stages in personal and species evolution." "The Tarot," he asserts, "is a concise, accurate blueprint of the {multi-billion year}course of neurogentic evolution, {past and future}. The skeletal structure of the system is accurate although the verbal labels and role designations (Fool, Pope, Emperor, Hermit) are outdated, trite, and confusing."

Greg probably considers this "satanic demonology" or somesuch.

He'd probably be right, too. ;)

p.s. Leary started to the lose the plot in his later years, but I found his pre-LSD Harvard work to have value -- his Interpersonal Circumplex, in particular. Just imagine if the early luminaries in the Oist movement had bothered to consider this material, instead of positing and having faith in absolute and effortless autonomy. I wonder if we'd have the same fractures and fissures...

Image here.

Actually, I knew about Leary and the Tarot.

A similar attempt comparing codons and the I-Ching has been made by a Russian mathematician I know. His book is in Russian, which I can't read. However, I've heard him lecture several times at International Symmetry Association conferences

I am not of the opinion that DNA is in fact any sort of literal code - or even that it would get a good score on the grounds of "design" if it were a design project. I'd have to think of the "designer" as bumbling.

Crowley's Tarot in particular, on the other hand, is a product of design - meticulously careful design - and a mini-encyclopedia of esoteric lore.

Regarding the early luminaries in the O'ist movement, there's of course no way they'd have considered such material. Rand was suspicious even of hypnosis. She was condemnatory of Gurdjieff. She'd made negative comment way before she formulated Objectivism about persons becoming interested in Eastern mysticism, example Mullendore, if I recall right. No way.

And yet...the person she called the most heroic woman (sic - she said "woman") in history, quite contradicting Rand's psychologizing diatribe re the soul of the mystic in Galt's Speech, was Joan of Arc, who heard voices and was supported in her stalwart courage by her belief in God.

Ellen

[Ellen Stuttle]

Just as your free to presume that there is no design to DNA, that it follows no physical laws, and that it's all just blind stupid chaotic random chance.

I think your biggest skill is putting hodge-podge thoughts into other people's heads.

Ellen

[anthony]

Greg, There are people tearing their hair out, and I do believe you are enjoying yourself...

Your inability to answer says it all, Ellen. :wink:Greg

Yeah, answering gibberish sure is difficult.

Ellen

Well, that's your opinion. The question was simple and direct:

Is the design of DNA more sophisticated than the design of any human made machine?

In your opinion it either is, or it isn't. so I can understand your reluctance to admit the obvious, for it would reveal a truth.

Of course it is. Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention. 1000 years from now, I dunno.

Perhaps the "reluctance to admit the obvious"--it's a trite truth; I was probably four or five when I figured that one out--is a reluctance to have you jump up and down with joy revelling in your "truth" as revelation. You're the only one here not trying to be rational.

--Brant

Smuggled in assumptions, and you fell right into them, Brant.

Note, Greg presumes that there's a design to DNA, furthermore, a "sophisticated" one, again implying an intelligence at work.

...and that's my free choice. Just as your free to presume that there is no design to DNA, that it follows no physical laws, and that it's all just blind stupid chaotic random chance.

And notice that there is nothing preventing each of us from holding our respective views.

And on what basis do you assert that "Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention"?

Not merely complex. Sophisticated.

No DNA. No invention. For one rests upon the foundation of the other

How about this "simple" question:

Is Niagara Falls more remarkable, or Beethoven's Ninth Symphony?

Ellen

The Ninth.

And 50 trillion cells full of God-designed DNA made the free choice to compose it possible. Humans are His highest creation because we are conscious, self aware, and thus morally accountable for our behavior. Waterfalls are for the benefit of our enjoyment. We were not created for the waterfalls.

Greg

Greg, While people are tearing their hair out, I do believe you are enjoying yourself. Take pity on us, I beg you.

[tmj]

I see them more as screw ups, how hard is it to plan a riverbed with a consistent elevation?

Nothing keeps you from your chosen view.

Some people see beauty while others see ugliness.

Greg

But what of the view that the screw ups are themselves beautiful? A waterfall could be seen as a benevolent sign, a physical metaphor for contemplation. Life's flow like that of the river can at times be orderly and pacific, following a predictable deserved path and also be subject to tumultuous breaks. Stay the course and eventually the flow will resume its path.

Or the results of plate tectonics and such like, which maybe signs ...

[moralist]

I think your biggest skill is putting hodge-podge thoughts into other people's heads.

Ellen

The quote below is your own thought, Ellen. No one put it into your head other than by your own free choice to let them, so there is no need to play the victim.

I am not of the opinion that DNA is in fact any sort of literal code - or even that it would get a good score on the grounds of "design" if it were a design project. I'd have to think of the "designer" as bumbling.

There are few attitudes more ugly than ingratitude. And yet you have the freedom to have chosen it, as well everything else that comes along with it.

Greg

[Selene]

There are few attitudes more ugly than ingratitude. And yet you have the freedom to have chosen it, as well everything else that comes along with it.

Greg

Uh-oh ...bad move dude...

and upon further reflection, very un-Christian as I understand Christianity.

[moralist]

I see them more as screw ups, how hard is it to plan a riverbed with a consistent elevation?

Nothing keeps you from your chosen view.

Some people see beauty while others see ugliness.

Greg

But what of the view that the screw ups are themselves beautiful? A waterfall could be seen as a benevolent sign, a physical metaphor for contemplation.

How can it be a screw up if it possesses a benevolent purpose of making people more thoughtful and self reflective?

Life's flow like that of the river can at times be orderly and pacific, following a predictable deserved path and also be subject to tumultuous breaks. Stay the course and eventually the flow will resume its path.

Those tumultuous breaks are wake up calls to change course.

Greg

[moralist]

There are few attitudes more ugly than ingratitude. And yet you have the freedom to have chosen it, as well everything else that comes along with it.

Greg

Uh-oh ...bad move dude...

and upon further reflection, very un-Christian as I understand Christianity.

You don't understand Christianity.

Nowhere in it can be found the fallacy that ingratitude is beautiful.

Greg

[Selene]

There are few attitudes more ugly than ingratitude. And yet you have the freedom to have chosen it, as well everything else that comes along with it.

Greg

Uh-oh ...bad move dude...

and upon further reflection, very un-Christian as I understand Christianity.

You don't understand Christianity.

Nowhere in it can be found the fallacy that ingratitude is beautiful.

Greg

Ah, see, I did not realize that your particular personal understanding of Christianity was the touchstone for approved thought.

So, essentially, you have the approved "tablets" on "ingratitude," and, you can speak with eternal authority as to your "Nowhere" statement?

[Brant Gaede]

And on what basis do you assert that "Biology is infinitely more complex than any human invention"? Complex on what scale, by what criteria?

How about this "simple" question:

Is Niagara Falls more remarkable, or Beethoven's Ninth Symphony?

Ellen

The Ninth. So is Beethoven's biology. If you cannot find sophistication in biology, I can't show it to you. Maybe a biologist could. As for "design," I'd substitute "structure." I do note that "sophisticated" commonly implies a conscious agency behind the object discussed. I think that's too narrow.

--Brant

Do you seriously not see, re the Niagara/Beethoven's Ninth question, that you don't have a common scale and common criteria for comparison? Are you merely answering on the basis of your being more impressed by the Ninth?

As to biology, I've been an avid student of biology since I was in fourth grade, and I can go through a molecular biology textbook like candy. If you want to speak of "sophistication" using language in a loose fashion, that's one thing, but even loosely speaking, you don't have a common scale and common criteria for comparing to human machine design.

Biologists sometimes do speak loosely of the design of bio-molecules, of organs, of systems, but "structure" is the accurate term.

Ellen

Well, take the human organism--or any organism--and consider the natural complexity therein. It's all created, structured and ultimately controlled by its DNA, isn't it? The inference is the complexity begets the complexity. There appears to be a huge gap between inanimate matter and that respecting an "ungulfable bridge." I speculate there might be in-between forms of matter that have some life characteristics enabling evolution to a single celled animal.

That gap is what I'm really on about and I know of no explanation while Greg pretends to know. I don't know if he's deluded or a troll. He would say, of course, that he's neither.

--Brant

weak-minded hodge-podge receiver: He catches! He scores! (but ran the wrong direction?)

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

And yet...the person she called the most heroic woman (sic - she said "woman") in history, quite contradicting Rand's psychologizing diatribe re the soul of the mystic in Galt's Speech, was Joan of Ark, who heard voices and was supported in her stalwart courage by her belief in God.

Ellen,

Is that Noah's wife or stowaway or something from the Great Flood, or do you mean Joan of Arc?

Michael

[Ellen Stuttle]

I think your biggest skill is putting hodge-podge thoughts into other people's heads.

Ellen

The quote below is your own thought, Ellen. No one put it into your head other than by your own free choice to let them, so there is no need to play the victim.

I am not of the opinion that DNA is in fact any sort of literal code - or even that it would get a good score on the grounds of "design" if it were a design project. I'd have to think of the "designer" as bumbling.

Ah, we're back to victims.

Here is (the latest version of) the belief you put into my head:

Just as your free to presume that there is no design to DNA, that it follows no physical laws, and that it's all just blind stupid chaotic random chance.

Except for the "no design to DNA" (though not the "presume," since I concluded on the basis of significant amounts of knowledge, rather than presuming), the rest is your hodge-podge invention, not gotten from what I've said.

A comment about the "follows no physical laws" part. You talk about physical laws as set up in advance, as of course you would, since you think that your particular version of God set those laws up and requires matter and energy to follow them.

I do not think of physical laws as something that precedes the physical world but instead as human abstractions of our discoveries to date about what that world does. I think that what exists are regularities from which we abstract in forming our ideas of physical law.

The rest of your compilation, "blind stupid chaotic random chance," is a string of words that you throw together and shuffle around in various pronouncements of your (false) Alternative Two Views. I think all you mean by them is "dumb viewpoint."

In any case, "blind" and "stupid" don't belong in the string, since they're anthropomorphizing. The other three terms for the most part aren't synonyms as used by scientists and mathematicians. (There are variations in meaning of the terms between those categories, and sometimes "random" and "chance" are used as synonyms especially by biologists, but the terms are distinct.) None accurately describes my view of basic natural process. (From certain perspectives, in certain contexts, "random" applies, but with special meaning for those perspectives and contexts.)

I'll add something in a minute about the term "chaos" as used in chaos theory - don't want to risk losing the post while copying from an info site.

Ellen

Add: In case readers have heard of the field "chaos theory" and don't realize that it isn't about "chaos" in a colloquial sense, here is a link to a brief article on the subject.

The article starts:

Chaos theory is the study of nonlinear dynamics, in which seemingly random events are actually predictable from simple deterministic equations.

[Ellen Stuttle]

And yet...the person she called the most heroic woman (sic - she said "woman") in history, quite contradicting Rand's psychologizing diatribe re the soul of the mystic in Galt's Speech, was Joan of Ark, who heard voices and was supported in her stalwart courage by her belief in God.

Ellen,

Is that Noah's wife or stowaway or something from the Great Flood, or do you mean Joan of Arc?

Michael

Te-he. I'll have to tell that one to Larry. He enjoys little word flips like that, and we'll probably get some further mileage out of it. I fixed it in the post.

Ellen